25 Sep Round Up: Reel: An Homage to the Cowboy Tradition

Each autumn, as cooler weather brings color to leaves and deposits dustings of snow in the mountains, a group of cowboys heads into central Montana’s Highwood Mountains on horseback to gather the area ranchers’ cows and bring them home. After spending the summer turned out, grazing on mountain grasses, the cows, their calves, and the bulls are returned to the ranches’ pastures where they’ll brave the region’s cold.

“The Highwood Cattle Roundup has been happening exactly this same way since 1912, with a small group of regional cowboys passing the torch from generation to generation,” says director Brian Liu, who worked with producer Andrew Labens to create a film that memorializes this Western tradition. Only Roundup Remains provides an intimate glimpse into the lifestyle of a generational ranching family through the perspective of an aging father, his two sons, and their extended family. 

BRIAN LIU

For much of his childhood, Labens, who partly grew up in Montana, heard mystical stories and legends of the roundup from his cowboy neighbors, which eventually sparked the idea to document this disappearing tradition.  

BRIAN LIU

Now available to stream on Amazon Prime, the film is an award recipient from the Montana International Film Festival, Flathead Lake International Cinemafest, New West Film Fest, and DC Independent Film Festival, among others.